Special Pages - 特設ページ

2014/10/05

ORIGINAL RESOLUTION

TRANSLATION

TRANSLATED TEXT

Committee
on Reevaluation of Global Information Strategy

Headquarters
for Regional Diplomatic and Economic Partnership

Liberal
Democratic Party

September 19, 2014

Resolution

The Asahi Shimbun has acknowledged to have made falsified reports on the ‘comfort women’ issue. The falsified
reports communicated by the Asahi Shimbun have become the basis of global media
coverage that have distorted the global perception of our history and as a result
have seriously impaired our nation’s reputation and our national interest.

Although the public apology made by Asahi Shimbun
is far from redeeming the honor of our people and serving our national interest, the
facts about the so-called “forcible recruitment” of comfort women have now been refuted, along with the alleged sexual abuses. So the ongoing installment of comfort women statues around the world has now completely lost their ground.

In the international community Japan has consistently
aspired and acted out for peace and democracy. Thus, we must act resolutely to rectify these wrongful global perceptions.

What we must do is to consistently voice
our rightful position as a nation, in an all-out effort, in the
seat of UN and other venues of foreign diplomacy as well as in places of international dialogue. This voice is meaningless unless it is heard
adequately and accurately by the global audience.

Despite our ongoing effort to strengthen disclosure
of information and outreach in the international arena, rather
than taking a 'neutral' or 'defensive' position we must take a more proactive role
in communicating our information so as to protect our sovereignty and our
interest. We must therefore establish a solid national information strategy and
at the same time be vigilant against information and developments overseas so
as to respond with agility. As a nation, we must firmly aim towards establishing an aggressive policy to that end.

Translation by Office BALÉS

SIDENOTE:

The interim report leading up to the "Resolution" was officially delivered to the Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga on 23 June 2014 and the Committee members met with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as well. So the government had full knowledge of the report which led up to the adoption of the September committee resolution. However, this was of course before the Asahi revelation was made.

The work of the new committee set up on 27 March 2014 was not only welcome by the member of Cabinet on 19 June 2014, including Prime Minister Abe himself and Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, but were "encouraged to bolster their activities" by PM Abe and appreciated "for the party's strong support" on areas of concern--information warfare--by FM Kishida. Chief Cabinet Secretary Suga also commented with deep appreciation on 23 June saying, "Further effort will be most welcome!".